Skywatcher
by espeon16
Summary: Sometimes Rukia just likes to stand still and look up at the sky. AU, Ichiruki, oneshot.


Rukia likes to stand still and just look up at the sky.

Sometimes, if she focuses on the right thing, she feels like she can see the clouds soaring away from her, and bringing the world with them.

She likes to stare at the sky everywhere – in fields, by rivers, at parks, out her bedroom window.

Byakuya-nii says it's a strange habit that should be stopped.

She says it helps her to forget.

Forget about the world.

* * *

><p>Their first meeting is one she cannot forget, at least for a long while more.<p>

She remembers the sweat on his brow, causing simple strands of his bright-orange hair to stick to his forehead. She remembers the fluidity with which he moves, sparring opponent after opponent while she just watches, entranced.

He moves like a tiger.

A tiger in a white karate _gi_, but a tiger, nonetheless, complete with a fierce scowl etched upon his face.

After the demonstration he introduces himself as the Karate Club's vice-chairman Kurosaki. His gaze sweeps across the row of new members, stopping at her where she is kneeling at the end of the line.

Just then, she feels her heart skip a beat. Just for a moment.

* * *

><p>She cannot exactly remember when they began talking, or when they became more of friends than acquaintances, but it must have happened somewhere in the technicolor blur of classes and lunches and sparring practice.<p>

Kurosaki, she discovers, is a man of few words and even fewer smiles, going around most days with a sullen scowl pretty much carved onto his face.

It's not particularly endearing, but it is what attracts her to him. Rukia likes to call it _stoic aloofness_, other girls would probably call it _cold and unapproachable_. That's what sets her apart from everyone else, and she wonders if he sees her differently from everyone else, like she does.

Sometimes, Rukia thinks she wonders and daydreams a little too much.

She can't help it, because it's probably the most she can do.

* * *

><p>He calls her <em>chibi<em>, something she only lets him call her. Everybody else notices except him, and probably everyone except him knows that she's got a secret crush on him.

She calls him _idiot_ in response most of the time, and everybody except him senses the veiled affection behind the term.

Sometimes, Rukia wishes Kurosaki wasn't that much of an oblivious blockhead. But then she realizes that he never notices only because she's too shy to make the signs more obvious.

* * *

><p>Sometimes, Rukia wishes feelings were less <em>complicated<em>.

* * *

><p>Rukia likes to stand still and look up at the sky.<p>

Sometimes, if she concentrates hard enough, she can feel tendrils of wind twining around her before soaring towards the sunlight-stained clouds, taking her worries with her.

The wind is light, carefree and unburdened. It flies everywhere and anywhere, never restrained by anything.

Rukia occasionally wonders if life might be much less complicated if she was the wind.

* * *

><p>It's a secret that nobody except herself knows, but sometimes, Rukia just likes to imagine possibilities.<p>

What if she managed to gather the courage to confess him?

In her head, she imagines him looking away in that _tsundere_ manner of his, before grudgingly saying _"I like you too."_ after an excruciatingly long and tense pause.

Or maybe, just maybe, he'll confess first. Then she will say _"I've liked you since long ago, idiot."_ or some other cheesy line straight off one of those Monday night dramas, before flinging herself at him with her eyes full of happy tears.

And maybe he'll wrap his arms – toned from years of training – around her body and never let go.

Maybe.

* * *

><p>And then the alarm rings, and reality comes crashing back down like a cold tsunami wave.<p>

Dreams, Rukia decides, are always too good to ever come true.

* * *

><p>Rukia likes to stand still and just simply look up at the sky.<p>

If she tries hard enough, she can imagine all her worries trickling away like a bubbling mountain stream, carried aloft by tiny whispers of wind away from her, to where all the clouds in the sky drift to.

So, she tries her best to look at it as often as possible.

Byakuya-nii says it's a strange habit that should be stopped.

She says it helps her to forget.

Forget about the complicated feelings that make her heart ache and her dreams all the more bittersweet.

And sometimes, Rukia looks up in the night sky as well, even though there aren't any clouds to see, because maybe, just maybe, she might see a shooting star fly across the dark sky like the one she remembers seeing back when she was a child.

Maybe, just maybe, the day will come when she can make a wish on one.

Until then she'll just wait.

Wait, and continue looking at the endless sky.


End file.
